by Alyssa Day
“I’m not usually so weak,” he said, pulling away from her. “Justice scored a hit exactly where that vampire’d stabbed me in the attack the other night. My internal organs were not yet entirely healed from that, I think.”
“And you’ve been abstaining from drinking blood since you found me, haven’t you?”
“All but once,” he admitted.
Her eyes narrowed. “Was she pretty?”
In spite of the danger of their situation, he laughed a little. “He was a large, sunburned tourist with an ‘Arizona is for Lovers’ T-shirt, and I only took a little.”
She tilted her head and moved her braid to one side of her neck, baring the other side to him. It was as sensuous and provocative as if she’d removed her clothing, and his breathing sped up in spite of his resolve not to do this monstrous thing.
“Please, Daniel. Please help me save my sisters,” she whispered, and his resolve crumpled into dust like the fragile bones of long-forgotten principles.
His fangs descended, and he clamped a tight control on the bloodlust, which was screaming at him to take her blood, take all of it, take her, take everything.
“Just a little bit. Just enough to heal this wound.”
“And enough to strengthen you for what lies ahead. There are certainly going to be those ready to try to stop us,” she said, looking up at him with those incredibly lovely eyes. “I trust you, Daniel. Maybe more than you trust yourself.”
“That wouldn’t be hard to do.” He still only half-believed he was going to do it, but she was right. If they didn’t gain a little strength, their mission was doomed, and her death was all but certain.
Or maybe he was lying to himself. It didn’t matter, though. He couldn’t fight both Serai and himself. He was going to do this.
He leaned closer and put the tiniest bit of compulsion in his gaze, calling on the nightwalker magic to help him seduce her into enjoying his bite instead of feeling the pain as his teeth punctured her skin.
She sighed as she went under, smiling dreamily up at him. “Oh, Daniel, I want to affirm life with you again right now. Is that normal?”
Her smile blasted through the last of the battle-hardened defenses that he’d built around his heart and he fell, body and soul. He was hers, and she was his. What better way to strengthen that bond?
He kissed her neck, very gently, and then sank his fangs into her skin directly over her pulse. The rush of her blood was like nothing he’d ever tasted or experienced before, and the taste was beyond description. Spicy and exhilarating and delicious; as if a fountain of pure magic were entering his mouth and body. He had to fight against the bloodlust and against his own monstrous instincts to force himself to take only a little; only enough that he could feel his body healing and renewing itself.
He carefully closed the puncture marks on her neck with his tongue, and then he bent his forehead to hers. “Thank you, mi amara. You have revived me, my beautiful one.”
Her head lolled back against his arm, and his heart jumped in his chest as he realized that even the little blood he’d taken might have been too much for her, in her weakened state.
“’S my turn?” she said, her words slurring. “Feel a l’il drunk.”
“Yes, it’s your turn. Hang on.” He frantically tore the sleeve of his shirt in his haste to get it out of the way and then bit into his wrist. Carefully holding it over her mouth, he lifted her head up so she wouldn’t choke.
She hesitated but didn’t fight him before she closed her mouth around the tear in his skin and drank. As he watched, he could see the lines of strain on her beautiful face smooth out and disappear. She only drank from him for a very little while—less than half a minute—and the pure sensuality of the experience was enough to drive him nearly mad. He’d shared blood before, but it had never been like this. The headiest aphrodisiac could not compare to the feel of Serai’s lips on his skin, and the sight of her throat as she drank. The sensation of his blood being pulled from his skin and into her mouth was enough to sear every nerve ending in his body into a throbbing readiness.
If they ever shared blood while making love, he thought he might die from the sheer pleasure of it.
She leaned her head back, away from his wrist, and he closed the wound with a quick swipe of his tongue. She smiled up at him, and it was the smile of a woman well sated by her man—a smile so sensual and seductive that it took every ounce of his willpower to keep from stripping her clothes from her and plunging into her right there on the ground.
“I feel so very much better,” she said, still smiling. “Still a little drunk, but in a good way. I feel like I could run a thousand miles and fight a thousand enemies.”
“Drinking vampire blood can have that effect sometimes,” he said, returning her smile.
“And the other part? Is it always so . . . sexual?” She bit her lip, as if afraid of the answer.
“No, never,” he said firmly. “I have never felt like that when taking blood or sharing my own. Usually it’s more like drinking a glass of juice.”
She giggled, actually giggled, and he thanked any gods who were listening that this insane plan had worked, but she quickly sobered. “We have to go now, Daniel. I can feel the Emperor more strongly than ever. Its power is building, as if . . . it sounds strange, I know, but almost as if the gemstone is becoming angry at its misuse. Does that make any sense at all?”
“It’s the possession of a god, Serai. Anything at all can make sense; the more frightening, the more plausible, I think.”
He helped her to stand up, and then, because he could keep from doing so no more than he could keep from breathing, he kissed her, long and deep. The energy from her blood rushed through him, potent and powerful, and he believed he could take on Poseidon himself for that gem.
“Do you hear it?” Serai looked around, an expression of pure awe on her face. “The sounds of the night. They’re so clear now. Is that because I drank your blood? Does it always sound so incredibly beautiful to you, as if your dreams themselves were transformed into music?”
“I remember a time, long, long ago, when the enhanced nightwalker senses seemed magical to me,” he said. “But never as magical as they do now, with you here to share them with me.”
“We can explore the world together, Daniel. After this quest is done, and my sisters safely restored.” She twirled around like a giddy girl, laughing and flinging her arms wide. “All over the world, what do you say?”
“As you wish,” he said, smiling at the memory of another princess, in a movie Ven had once shown him. “I can be the Dread Pirate Daniel.”
She stopped twirling and stared at him, perplexed. “What? A pirate?”
He laughed. “It’s a long story, for another time. For now, maybe you should contact Conlan and Ven so they can hurry up and—”
“No! I will not call them, nor answer their call. I don’t trust them.” She yanked the backpack up off the ground and took off walking so fast she was nearly running.
He raced to catch up with her. “What do you mean?”
“They must have known Lord Justice was planning to attack. Perhaps they even ordered him to do so. I don’t trust them. Who knows what secret agenda they have? If my sisters die because of their political maneuvering or whatever reason they sent Justice after us, without telling us, then they will pay for it with every ounce of magic I still possess.”
“But we don’t know that Justice didn’t act on his own. Besides, we need all the help we can get, Serai. I won’t risk your life.” He knew even as he said it that it was no good. She wasn’t listening, but he had to try.
She glared at him, raising her chin in that determined way she had, and he knew he’d been right. “Nor will I risk yours. That sword wound could have killed you, and I blame High Prince Barnacle Dung for it. We go on alone. Now that I’m so much stronger, I can use my magic to mask our trail and my presence, even on the mental pathway, from other Atlanteans.” She paused and took his hand. “I feel it, Daniel. I feel
that this is the way it’s meant to be. Please? I need your help.”
He sighed. There they were, those four deadly words again.
“As you wish, Princess. As you wish.”
Chapter 24
As Ivy slept, wrapped in a sleeping bag on an air mattress on the cave floor, Nicholas watched her, reassuring himself that she was well; merely sleeping and not unconscious. Not that he cared about her. No, she was merely a tool, and as he’d said, he kept his tools in good working order.
He forced himself to walk away from her, although there wasn’t really anyplace to go. They were holed up in a cave, like animals. Not his first choice of accommodations, especially when he had a perfectly serviceable mansion in Sedona, but he’d been afraid that moving Ivy would harm her further. Overuse of her magic, combined with the shock from seeing him kill Smithson, had pushed her past the limit of what she could endure.
Her son, who had finally succumbed to his own exhaustion, slept in his own sleeping bag next to his mother. Ian had more courage than most adults Nicholas had encountered in his many years. The boy had demanded that Nicholas turn him into a vampire, so that he would be more fully capable of protecting his mother from “scum like you” in the future.
Brave, and a little foolish, like the best of all possible boys. Nicholas allowed himself a moment to mourn his long-dead son and, even more, to mourn the death of their relationship. Lingering on what might have been, though, was never productive. Nicholas lived in the present and dealt with the here and now. He’d always found it a more efficient and useful way to live his life.
He was practical. Pragmatic. Whatever benefited him the most was the course to take. Always.
His gaze involuntarily returned to Ivy, and he scowled. His feelings for this woman were an unwanted complication. A conundrum. She had no value to him beyond her use as a witch who could wield the gem. And yet he found himself wishing he could make her more comfortable.
Get to know her, perhaps. Make her see that he wasn’t entirely a murdering bastard.
And then what? Flowers and candlelight?
He pivoted and walked to the entrance of the cave and motioned to one of the vampires in his blood pride. “Find me someone to eat.”
“Do you have to do that a lot?” Ian walked up next to him, but not too near. “Eat people?”
“I thought you were asleep,” Nicholas snapped. “Go back to bed.”
“I can’t really sleep when my mom is in danger, and we’re hanging out with a bunch of bloodsuckers, no offense, dude.” Ian covered a huge yawn with his hand.
“None taken,” Nicholas said dryly. “Do you have any sense of self-preservation at all?”
“What, because you could kill me with your little finger or whatever?” Ian shrugged his thin shoulders. “Sure, I’m scared. I’m not stupid. But she’s my mom, dude. Wouldn’t you do anything—risk anything—for your mom?”
Nicholas glared down at the boy, but realized that, oddly enough, he was willing to continue the conversation. “Yes, I would have done anything for my mother. And don’t call me dude.”
“Sorry, but I don’t exactly know your name,” Ian pointed out.
“Nicholas.”
Ian stuck out his hand. “I’m Ian Khetta, Mr. Nicholas.”
For the first time in centuries, Nicholas found himself shaking hands with a teenage boy. “Just Nicholas. I know who you are, Ian Khetta, son of Ivy Khetta. Do you know your mother is a sorceress of the dark arts?”
Ian recoiled. “That’s not true. She’d never do that, not after what happened to her mom. I don’t know where you get your information, dude—ah, Mr. Nicholas—but it’s dead wrong.”
“I’m never wrong, boy,” Nicholas informed him, baring his fangs just because he could and because, in some bizarre manner, he felt like he was losing control of the conversation. “Go eat a sandwich or something. Aren’t human boys always hungry?”
“Aren’t vampires always eating people?”
Nicholas bared his fangs. “Just give me a minute.”
Ian’s face turned pale under his sunburn and freckles, but he didn’t back down, making Nicholas feel a twinge of admiration for the boy.
Which annoyed him.
“Yeah, I get it, you’re the big, bad guy here, but I have some information I’d like to trade,” Ian said.
“What kind of information?”
“Information that could make you rich,” Ian said.
“I’ m already rich.”
“Richer, then. Look, do you want to hear it or not?”
“In return for this information, which is likely to be useless, what do you want?” Nicholas leaned against the wall of the cave and folded his arms across his chest, waiting for the boy to make his unreasonable demands, so he could laugh in Ian’s face.
“I just want my mom to be safe,” Ian said, squaring his shoulders. “You can keep me, or drink my blood, or whatever, but you have to promise to let my mom go. She can’t channel this much magic, or she’s going to get a brain aneurysm and die. Also, like I told you earlier, I want to be a vampire like you, so nobody can ever threaten Mom again.”
Nicholas’s composure cracked, for just a moment. This child—this boy not even old enough to shave—was offering his own life for his mother’s. It had been a very, very long time since Nicholas had seen anything but selfishness from anyone, human or vampire, and his fixed-in-stone worldview took a major hit. It didn’t shatter—it didn’t even come close to shattering—but the foundations crumbled, just the tiniest bit.
“Ian, I will find a way to keep your mom safe,” he said rashly. Stupidly.
“Do you promise?”
He grabbed the boy by the front of his shirt and jerked him up in the air, holding him so high that his feet dangled a good twenty inches off the ground.
“Do not try my patience, boy, or question my word,” he hissed, allowing the full force of his power to show in his undoubtedly glowing red eyes. “Give me the information or do not. It matters not a bit to me. I have said I will find a way to keep Ivy Khetta safe, and I always do what I say. Now, go eat something or sleep, or whatever you want to do, but do it quietly, and do not bother me again.”
He dropped the boy, but Ian had good reflexes and landed on his feet, knees bent, and then straightened up. The boy’s face was glowing a hot red, but he didn’t storm off toward his mother, as Nicholas had expected.
“Fair is fair. You said you’d protect my mom, and I said I’d give you information,” the boy said. He walked to the center of the cave, directly underneath the hole in the ceiling from which the rubies had poured down, and pointed up.
“Nobody else but me bothered to look up at the ceiling, inside that hole. Everybody was too busy staring at the rubies, or then at what you did to that guy . . .” Ian faltered for a moment, but then he recovered and looked back up at the ceiling. “There’s another cave painting in there. Like the one the other guy said was so important to the story of what the deal is with that gem you’re making my mom use.”
“In the ceiling? Fascinating.” Nicholas leapt into the air and rose through the cave until his head was actually inside the hole in the ceiling, which put him close enough to see the painting but unfortunately blocked the light.
He snapped his fingers and pointed to one of his vampires. “Light.”
The minion rushed to bring him one of the lanterns and held it up as high as he could reach. Few could fly, as Nicholas could. The ones who could, he had on patrol.
Raising the lantern, Nicholas looked around again and blinked. He blew out a long, slow whistle.
“Boy, you have just earned yourself a reward. I believe this painting contains the secret of the amethyst.” He looked down at Ian, who was shifting from foot to foot nervously.
“I am going to be richer than Midas and quite possibly invulnerable. You, my boy, have just earned your ticket to that immortality you asked me for earlier. When you reach twenty-one, if you still desire it, I will turn you va
mpire.”
“Over my dead body,” Ivy said. She walked into the space directly below where Nicholas was still floating up by the ceiling and pointed a shaking hand, rimmed in purple fire, at him. “I will kill you now, vampire, before I will let you destroy my son’s future.”
Nicholas felt a very rare smile stretch its slow and unfamiliar way across his face. “Now, finally, things are going to get interesting.”
Chapter 25
Ven searched the canyons and riverbanks as he flew overhead, looking for any sign of a magic amethyst, murdering vampires, or an evil witch and wondering when things had gotten so freaking weird that a warrior from Atlantis felt like he was in the middle of a twisted faery tale.
Or a really bad joke.
So, a vampire, a witch, and an Atlantean walk into a bar . . .
Justice’s call broke into his mental meanderings with a bang, so powerful and furious that Ven nearly fell out of mist form and slammed into the tree he was soaring past.
COME NOW COME NOW COME NOW THE VAMPIRE ATTACKED HER AND WE ARE DOWN COME NOW COME NOW.
He arrowed for the ground, transforming back into his body as he went, and landed lightly next to a shining cloud of mist that instantly turned into his brother.
“What in the nine hells was that?”
Conlan shook his head. “I have no idea. Justice sounds like he could chew through that sword of his, but the vampire attacked her? What vampire? Surely not Daniel?”
Ven sent a mental message to Justice but only got a zap of weird static in response.
“He’s not answering. Either he’s down and out, or he’s gone so ballistic that the Nereid half of him took over.”
“Neither is good,” Conlan said grimly. He launched into the air, transforming back into mist mid-jump, and Ven followed his brother’s lead, heading up and out to find his other brother, and hoping they weren’t too late.
Minutes later, they found Justice, lying immobile on the grass a short distance from the creek bank.
Trap? Ven sent to Conlan.